The funds are intended by proponents of the bill to go to pro-choice organizations such as Fund Texas Choice and The Bridge Collective, which help women get abortions.
The lawsuit was filed the day after the city council approved the new budget and abortion amendment.
Earlier this year, the Texas Legislature passed SB 22 to ban government entities from funding abortion providers or their affiliates (e.g. Planned Parenthood).
State Senator Donna Campbell (R-New Braunfels), who authored the bill, said in a statement after the amendment had been proposed that it “defiantly violates the spirit of Senate Bill 22, if not an outright violation against the law.”
“Proponents of abortion gave Texas ‘the middle finger’ in flagrantly violating SB 22,” Zimmerman said in an email to The Texan. “I’ve suggested they use their remaining index finger to thumb through this iron-clad 8-page legal challenge to their $150k taxpayer subsidies to abortion.”
One of the outspoken proponents of the bill, Councilman Greg Casar, reportedly said, “The lawsuit reads like Zimmerman just stepped out of a misogynist time machine, and he doesn’t realize that things like abortion, interracial marriage, and birth control are suddenly all legal now.”
You can read the lawsuit in its entirety below.
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Daniel Friend
Daniel Friend is the Marketing and Media Manager for The Texan. After graduating with a double-major in Political Science and Humanities, he wrote for The Texan as a reporter through June 2022. In his spare time, you're likely to find him working on The Testimony of Calvin Lewis, an Abolition of Man-inspired novel and theatrical podcast.
